


The Old World

by Merileigh



Series: Bound [1]
Category: GreedFall (Video Game)
Genre: And a partial explanation for why Constantin is Constantin, Canon-Typical Violence, Foreshadowing for the end of the game, Gen, Not a Disney princess, The superhero origin story of Detective (Lady) De Sardet, Things get dicey
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-18
Updated: 2020-02-01
Packaged: 2021-02-19 06:56:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 10,646
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22307041
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Merileigh/pseuds/Merileigh
Summary: “I want you to discover who poisoned my son, Niece,” he said, quietly. I raised my head, and he added, his voice forbidding, “Careful. Just nod.”I did and ventured a question. “Is there anyone you suspect, Your Majesty?”“I suspect anyone and everyone.”
Relationships: Constantin d'Orsay/De Sardet, Kurt & De Sardet (GreedFall)
Series: Bound [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1619806
Comments: 6
Kudos: 36





	1. A Cage

The sun was already warming the stones in the courtyard when Constantin threw himself down beside me on the bench, eyeing the pistol I was cleaning before glancing up at my face.

“So?” he asked with a conspirator’s smile. “Did your adventure last night bear fruit?”

“Constantin!” I hissed in reply, fighting the urge to look over my shoulder. “Not here!”

“It’s only Kurt, Cousin.”

Kurt, who inconveniently had hearing like a cat’s, had come up behind me during this exchange. I felt his stare on the back of my neck and heartily regretted telling Constantin my plan, even if he had distracted Kurt and kept him out of my path.

Constantin’s smile did not waver, though Kurt must have turned that interrogating stare on him. “Is this what was behind your sudden interest in charming a Naut girl down at the port last night?” Kurt asked. “I wondered why you’d forgotten about your Miranda.”

Constantin, his long legs stretched out in front of him, leaned back to meet Kurt’s eyes. I looked from Constantin’s smile to Kurt’s scowl beneath the brim of his hat. “Miranda is as sweet as ever,” Constantin said, shrugging one shoulder. “I’m sure I’ll be inclined to see her tonight.”

“Tonight,” Kurt repeated. “The day is young, princeling. And your mornings belong to me. Now, up. You’ll spar with Otto.”

“Yours is the only face I wish to see in the morning, Kurt.” With a seriousness that neither of us believed--perhaps it was because his lips were twitching at the corner--Constantin got to his feet and saluted us both with the hilt of his rapier before striding away across the courtyard. Normally his mirth would have made me glad, and I would have joined in his laughing and playing. But now he’d left me alone with Kurt and without any distractions at hand.

I tried to escape by seeming eager, standing with my pistol just after Constantin had left. “I’ll practice with the straw men,” I said, glancing away to where the targets had been mounted on poles.

Kurt stopped me with a hand on my arm. “Does your uncle need to pay another Coin Guard to protect your virtue, Green Blood?” It was his sobriquet for me. Once when I’d been too obviously proud of my accuracy with the pistol, he’d told me that until I’d aimed at a man intending to kill him, my blood would run green. And that I shouldn’t wish to be too handy with a gun.

Now his prying made me angry. I lifted my chin and glared at him. “My virtue,” I said, biting off the syllables, “is mine to protect. And it’s as whole today as it was yesterday.”

His fingers closed on my arm, not harshly but firm enough to keep me there. “I’m asking because I know the adventures that Constantin gets up to,” he said, studying my face as I looked up at his eyes and the scars around them. He paused long enough that I was afraid the flush of my skin would give me away. “You know full well I can’t always watch you both. Have a care for yourself, my lady.”

I nodded mutely, and this time he let me go when I pulled away.

The sun was halfway to its highest point when Kurt declared that we were fit to survive another day. As we were walking from the courtyard, Constantin draped an arm over my shoulders and pulled me against his side, grinning when I grimaced at the sweat darkening his sleeve. “So?” he asked again.

“It was…” I murmured, searching for words to describe what had happened. “I didn’t realize it would be so…clumsy. Or that we would laugh so much.” If, as most men said, my virtue resided between my legs, then it had been defeated last night—or fled, or been lost. Regardless of the metaphor, I felt the same—more aware of my body, perhaps, and more frustrated by the control my uncle held over it—but I felt just as capable of virtue or the lack of it as I had felt yesterday.

“Well, do you feel liberated at all?” Constantin asked.

I looked away. “No. Only more aware of the cage.”

“Take heart, Cousin. I hear that both the doctor and the duke have left,” he said, all the laughter gone out of his voice. His hand chafed my shoulder. “Likely their coffers weren’t rich enough for my father.”

More likely that they hoped to have me cheaply due to my face, I thought. I wouldn’t say that aloud; we’d had this conversation before. Speculating, talking in circles like this would drive me mad with anxiety. If I had to be married off for the benefit of the Prince d’Orsay, I wished that he would hurry and decide my fate.

***

Our morning practice with Kurt kept me calm during those days. The next morning, Constantin and I stood across from each other in the center of the courtyard. Constantin was taller, stronger, and had a longer reach than I did, but I had been quick enough to score points against him in the past. This was the moment when the scope of the world narrowed to things that were within my control. If only time would stop for me here!

I wound my long hair into a knot at the nape of my neck, while Constantin pulled on his gloves. Kurt, watching from the side, waited until we found our stances then gave the command.

“Fight with honor!”

Constantin stepped forward and lunged, swiping a blow down toward my shoulder, his long stride easily closing the distance between us. I pivoted away and struck at his unprotected side, grinning when the dulled point of my rapier hit his padded doublet.

“Point,” Kurt called.

Constantin broke away and circled me at a distance. “Are you quicker this morning, fair cousin?”

Kurt’s raised voice broke in before I could reply. “You might be faster, Constantin, if you’d slept last night.”

I swallowed a laugh, and Constantin raised his eyebrows at me, his answering smile tense as he closed for another strike. I parried, clumsily, and had to duck away. He let me go, turning to Kurt and spreading his hands wide, “Why waste the night on sleep, Kurt?”

Kurt answered by jerking his chin in my direction, and Constantin turned to find me ready and within striking distance. I brought my blade up to lunge for his shoulder. He managed to parry, but only just. He was off balance; the next point was mine.

But with his next step, Constantin stumbled, and the look on his face made me pause. He looked at me, frowning, taking a breath to speak. Then his rapier clattered to the stones as his right leg gave out beneath him. I caught him as he was falling. His weight bore us both down, and as my knees hit the stones and he sagged against me, I heard the shouts rising from all sides of the courtyard.

“Constantin?” Something was dragging at one side of his face. His eyelid drooped and one side of his mouth. His eyes were fixed on mine as his throat worked to swallow. I shifted to hold him upright against one of my legs. “Constantin, can you speak?”

Kurt had reached us. Constantin’s gaze moved from my face to his, and he managed, almost choking on the words, to say, “I can’t—”.

“He’s been poisoned,” Kurt said. “He needs a doctor!” The men that had gathered around us reacted to the implicit order in Kurt’s tone, reaching down and picking Constantin up with strong hands under his shoulders and legs. When Kurt stood to follow them from the courtyard, I got to my feet behind him, grabbing his arm.

“Kurt, what happened?”

“Green Blood.” He blew out a breath and passed one hand through his close-shorn hair, dislodging his hat. “I couldn’t tell you.” When he met my eyes, his own were troubled, his brows drawn.

“What did he do last night? Did he eat or drink anything unusual?”

“He spent the night with Lady Miranda at the house of a friend—Marchand,” he replied, crossing his arms over his chest. “As he’s done almost every night since he managed to chase her down. I doubt he ate anything; your cousin forgets to eat more than any man I’ve met. But he had wine. He tossed back a glass as we were leaving this morning.”

I searched the ground at my feet, thinking. “Do you think he’s made enemies?” I asked, though I did not want to say the words out loud. I knew Constantin like he was my own brother. He was reckless, in words and actions, but he would never willfully harm someone without cause.

“Every d’Orsay has enemies, Green Blood,” was Kurt’s reply. “Come on now,” he added, putting a hand on my shoulder to shepherd me out of the courtyard. “We can learn more from the doctor.”

***

Constantin’s door was closed to us when we reached the end of the corridor. The doctor stood outside, removing his mask. I felt a chill when I saw the plague mask, which must have shown on my face; when the doctor looked up and saw me, he was quick to say, “A precaution, my lady. We must always assume—but your guard guessed correctly. His Highness has been poisoned.”

“Will he live?”

“Yes, my lady; do not fear. He is in no mortal danger. He is suffering paralysis along his right side. I had the antidote in my stock, however, and with a few more doses over the course of days, he should regain all function.

“It was a lucky thing,” he added. “This is a rare poison, distilled from a flowering vine that grows in only a few locations in Alliance territory.”

Kurt spoke from behind me, “But not a deadly poison?”

“No,” the doctor repeated. “No, His Highness was never in mortal danger.”

Kurt muttered something under his breath. Before I could pull him away to learn what he was thinking, I heard the light tap of footsteps behind us and turned to see a page with the crest of the Merchant Congregation on his doublet. The boy bowed quickly, fine hair flying, and looked up at me. “The Prince d’Orsay requests your presence, my lady,” he said.

I ran my hands down the front of my doublet and reached up to tuck a stray strand of hair behind my ear. The prince may request, but even he would have to wait on my lady’s maid. I glanced at Kurt, who nodded. “I will find you later,” I said, before following the boy as he trotted back down the corridor.

An hour later, bathed, my hair arranged in a chignon—the stray strands framing my face artfully this time—and wearing a blue velvet gown salvaged and refashioned from one of my mother’s, I curtseyed before my uncle, the Prince d’Orsay. “Serene Majesty, I hail you,” I murmured, and kept my gaze lowered to the floor. There were several pairs of feet on either side of my uncle’s throne, all dressed in the boots and breeches commonly worn by members of the Congregation. I could not tell if the duke was among them, but I did not see the pantaloons that were the Alliance’s favored attire. Perhaps Constantin had been right, and the doctor at least was gone.

I had thought Constantin would be here with me when I heard this news from my uncle. I heard his voice in my thoughts, the words he’d said over a year ago when my uncle had first started soliciting suitable husbands for me.

_“It isn’t fair—isn’t_ right _—is it? That you should be subject to my father’s will in this, just because you were born a woman. It really isn’t.”_

“Lady De Sardet.” I raised my head when my uncle spoke and straightened from the curtsey. On either side of his throne stood his two chief advisors and beside them the steward and several footmen. There were no suitors in sight, but that left me with the unpleasant thought that they might be standing at the back of the receiving hall, watching me where I could not see them.

The Prince d’Orsay sat his throne as though it were a restless horse that he could tame through shear will, straight-backed, feet flat on the ground and evenly placed. He gestured for me to approach and even that gesture was restrained to the minimum of movement needed. I studied his face as unobtrusively as I could as I came to stand with my toes touching the edge of the carpeted dais. Age had lined my uncle’s face and faded his black hair to grey at the temples, but age and experience had also hardened his blue eyes to the sharpness of flint. Holding that gaze required will that I did not have in me today, and I was glad that protocol dictated I keep my eyes lowered.

“Tell me what happened to my son,” he said, and at that, I did look up at him, surprised. Surely he already knew, which meant that perhaps he wanted something else from me.

“Serene Majesty,” I started. “We were at practice with our master-at-arms. Constantin seemed to have some trouble moving, and the next moment he had lost control of his leg and arm and fell. His face, too,” I added, glancing up to gauge my uncle’s reaction, “one side of his face was affected. The doctor confirmed that he has been poisoned but says it will not take his life.”

“You’ve been asking questions about this.”

“Yes, Your Majesty.”

He stood, and I waited motionless while he came down the stairs. Silently, he offered me his arm, and I took it, walking with him as he escorted me back toward the doors.

“I want you to discover who poisoned my son, Niece,” he said, quietly. I raised my head, and he added, his voice forbidding, “Careful. Just nod.”

I did and ventured a question. “Is there anyone you suspect, Your Majesty?”

“I suspect anyone and everyone.”

We had reached the door, and I stepped away from him to curtsey once more. As I rose, I risked a glance around the receiving hall. All who were present were of House Orsay, servants or advisors or my uncle’s contracted Coin Guards—no rich gentlemen or their retinues.

“Is there something else, Niece?” my uncle asked.

“No, Your Majesty.” The questions that were pricking at me I would have to keep to myself, for now.

“I will call for you again in two days,” he said. At his nod, the guard standing at attention opened the door and set me free.


	2. The Old City

My skirts brushed the stones as I crossed the courtyard to go to the barracks. It felt strange to walk here, where I was usually unencumbered, in a gown. The sun was lowering now, and the courtyard was empty and half in shadow. Someone had retrieved Constantin’s rapier and mine where we’d left them. Kurt’s hat was gone.

“Kurt? I believe he’s sleeping, my lady,” the guard at the door to the barracks said when I asked.

“No,” I blurted when he turned as if to go in. “No, don’t trouble him.”

There were still several hours before it would be truly dark. I could go into the city and be back before there was any real danger. I was in the passageway that led to the courtyard in front of the palace when I heard the thump of footfalls and the ringing of a sword against metal fittings behind me and turned to see Kurt running to catch up.

“You were asleep,” I protested when I saw the look on his face.

“I’ll sleep well enough tonight, with Constantin confined to his bed. Unless you’re planning something I should know about.”

I started walking again to avoid his scrutiny, and we left the passageway for the thin light of late afternoon. “My uncle has asked me to find the person responsible for poisoning Constantin.”

“Green Blood—” he said and laughed once, without humor. He stopped, and I turned unwillingly to face him. “So you thought you would go into the city, alone, to chase would-be murderers? Are you armed?”

“I have my pistol,” I replied.

“Where?” He inspected my gown and petticoat, which I’d made sure betrayed no telltale signs of weaponry. “Under your skirts? You’d be dead twice over before you could reach—” He stopped when I pulled my hand, holding the pistol, from the long slit I’d cut in the seams of my skirts near my hip.

“And a knife,” I said, lifting the edge of my gown to my knee to reveal the old boots I was wearing, the hilt of a long knife sticking out of one.

“So you’ve put some thought into it.” He looked at me for a moment longer as I slipped the gun back into the belt that I wore low across my hips beneath my gown before shaking his head and gesturing for us to continue. “Lead on, then. Where are we going?”

I glanced at the position of the sun, not yet touching the cliffs that rose southwest of the old city. The air was cool, but not unpleasant. “The Promenade,” I said. “I think Miranda will be there.”

“Do you think she had something to do with it?”

“I don’t know,” I replied. “But I want to talk to her.”

Yesterday’s pyre was blackened logs and ash in Prince’s Place. There wouldn’t be another pyre for those who’d died of the malichor for several days, but already there was a cart in place piled with the bodies of the dead. We had to cross the square and go north to reach the park and wide, shaded avenue the nobility used for their pleasure walks, when the smoke and ash weren’t blowing inland.

I waited until that grim sight and the smells of wood smoke and death were behind us before I asked, “Kurt, what were you thinking when the doctor answered your question? When he said the poison wasn’t deadly.”

“That his answer doesn’t make sense, Green Blood. Why poison a man if you aren’t trying to kill him? What’s the point?” He was walking a step behind my right shoulder, and I slowed so we could walk side by side.

“Blackmail?” I asked, thinking aloud. “But the doctor is giving him the antidote now. A blackmailer would have no leverage left. –Could the doctor have wanted to appear the hero by saving the prince’s son, after poisoning him first?”

“It’s possible,” Kurt said. “He knew the plant that made the poison—a rare poison, he said—and happened to have the antidote at hand. But if that’s the case, he hasn’t made himself look much the hero by telling us that Constantin’s life was never in danger.”

We had reached the Promenade. Before we stepped out onto the boulevard, I looked up to meet Kurt’s eyes. “We should find the doctor later.”

“I won’t argue with that.” He gestured me forward and took up his place again behind me.

At this time of day, with the afternoon light slanting low, the nobility crowded the Promenade, lords and ladies walking in pairs and groups between the rows of tall, old linden trees, their heart-shaped leaves dropping to carpet the gravel path in gold. When I had been a child, this place had been brighter. Now, the ladies’ gowns and gentlemen’s coats were faded and worn in places that could no longer be hidden by the best tailoring. Coin Guards wearing blue and silver stood at the entrances to the streets leading off the Promenade, to keep the peace and the illusion that life in Sérène could continue as it had been.

I’d used to imagine, when I’d come here with my mother or Constantin, that the Promenade was like water, full of eddies and ripples. Small eddies would gather around my mother during her walks, lords and ladies paying their respects and trading in small talk. Constantin, when he could be persuaded to come, landed in the Promenade like a rock in a still pond, stirring up waves that didn’t settle even after he’d left.

Inevitable as it was, I still tried not to cause a ripple. But my eligibility had been public knowledge for a year, and even those who’d never been in the contest had to talk about their opinions. I raised my chin and pretended not to hear.

Miranda, standing with her brother and mother and dressed to match the season in a gown the color of rich toffee, saw me before I saw her and curtseyed as we approached. “Lady De Sardet.”

“Lady Miranda. –Will you walk with me?”

I waited until we’d left her family behind to speak, while she pretended to be more interested in the scenery than the reason I’d pulled her aside. “I’m afraid I’m bringing bad news,” I said finally. “Constantin was taken ill this morning, and I know he would have wanted someone he trusts to tell you. The doctor says he’s been poisoned.”

Her reaction caught my interest. Her face paled, and she brought her hands to her waist, clasping her fingers together. I imagined that her stays were suddenly digging into her ribs, feeling like they were cutting off her breath.

“Miranda, do you know something about this?” I had to catch myself to keep my voice calm and low, as though we were discussing fashion or something equally uninteresting.

“I—,” she started, then looked away, fighting to control her shaky breaths. “Am I suspected…of doing this?” she asked, turning back to me.

Behind me, Kurt made a sound low in his throat, and I realized that my own shoulders were tense and rising up toward my ears. I took a breath and ran my hands over my skirts to relax my fingers before I spoke. “Can you prove to me that you didn’t?”

I could see her trembling now. “I would never. Lady De Sardet, I would never jeopardize—”

“My cousin?” I prompted, when she didn’t say more.

“The relationship that we have,” she said, unwillingly. When I said nothing, she continued. “My family supports our affair. If we fall ill…the Prince employs the best doctors in the city.”

“Stop,” I said, “you don’t need to say more.” My feelings at hearing this were all tangled together, anger for Constantin, sympathy for Miranda, resignation—everything was available for trade in Sérène. “But tell me why you weren’t surprised to hear this.”

She glanced warily at Kurt, then back at me. “I was approached,” she said in a murmur. “There was a man who offered money if I gave Constantin poisoned wine. He wore a crow’s mask. –I swear to you that I refused him.”

“But Constantin drank wine in the morning when he left you, and an hour later he was paralyzed.”

She shook her head. “If that man knew me, Lady De Sardet, he would have known Hugo Marchand.”

***

It was full dark when we found Marchand, the son of a bookseller, leaned up against the bar in the Coin Tavern and surrounded by friends. Kurt held me back and shouldered his way into the group and their laughter to grab Marchand by the arm and invite him to share a bottle with us at a table.

“You’re a rare sight, Lady De Sardet,” Marchand said, stepping over the bench to sit across from us. It was easy to smile at him, even with my suspicions. Marchand and Constantin were very much alike, though Marchand had a steadier temper. People said, when they could be sure the words wouldn’t make it back to the Prince d’Orsay’s ears, that the two of them had kept the Coin Tavern afloat in the panic after the malichor had first appeared with their coin and their charisma.

I didn’t want to accuse him.

Kurt watched me hesitate for a long moment, then spoke, pouring Marchand a drink. “Constantin sends his regrets, Marchand. He won’t be joining you tonight, on account of poison.”

“What?” Marchand asked, laughing, though there was tension around his eyes that hadn’t been there before.

“My cousin came from your house this morning,” I said, meeting his eyes, “and was taken ill. He’s paralyzed, and the doctor has confirmed it was poison.”

Marchand turned his cup between his fingers and looked at me. “That troubles me more than I can say, my lady. You know he is a close friend. Will he recover?”

“We hope so. Marchand…I know it was your wine that poisoned him. Did you talk to a man in a plague mask?”

I registered that Marchand had moved only after he’d jumped to his feet and shoved the table into us, trapping Kurt and me against the table behind. I struggled to sit up, and Kurt swore loudly, almost toppling the table over as he pushed it away. Marchand was gone, though I could hear boots pounding down the stairs that led to parts of the tavern I’d never been permitted to visit.

Kurt’s hand was on my arm, and I shook my head when he asked if I was hurt. Then he was up and running for the door that led to the Coin Guard’s barracks. I heard him whistle sharply after he’d opened it and the muffled sounds of a conversation, followed by more pounding of boots.

“The city guard will find him,” he said when he came back, after I’d freed myself from the table and bench and stood, rubbing a hand over my ribs where I still felt the blow. At the bar, Marchand’s friends were watching us with suspicion and talking among themselves. The owner was opening a fresh bottle, trying to keep their attention.

Kurt glanced at them. “It’s getting late for civil talk, Green Blood." He nodded toward the door. “Time for us to go.”

The streets of the old city were close in most places, some with barely enough room for two people to pass between buildings or rows of shops and the canal. With so many businesses closed or households collapsed, there were more than a few places where no lamps were lit and the darkness of more wild places encroached. Kurt walked a little in front of me and kept one hand on my elbow.

I was busy with my thoughts, strategizing the best way to question the doctor. Could he have been the one in the plague mask? Doctors wore their masks filled with sweet herbs to keep from breathing the miasma that came with the blood plague, so we were told, but weren’t they also a tool for anonymity and distance? Had he paid Marchand to poison Constantin only to cure him?

We were still south of Prince’s Place in an alleyway that led off a small courtyard, when Kurt stopped so suddenly that I collided with him.

“Kurt—”

“Quiet.”

It was already quiet in the alley; I couldn’t hear anything at all. Kurt pulled me with him back toward the lit courtyard, but when I turned, I saw the silhouette of a man who’d placed himself across our path. There was the scraping sound behind us—another person, or maybe more, waited in the dark alleyway.

The shadow in front of us spoke. “Looks like we’re getting paid tonight, boys. Sir, my lady—let’s make this quick.”

“Move away,” Kurt muttered to me, maneuvering me with one arm into a doorway nearby. He drew the long knife from his belt and stood tall in front of me, the knife held loosely in his right hand. “Leave us,” he said to the three shadows that were coming for us. “We’re more trouble than we’re worth.”

“Only one way to know that—” Two of them reached for Kurt’s arms, but he moved first, grabbing one and pulling him into the other’s way. At the same time, he stabbed with the knife, and I heard one of the men gasp, making a terrible gurgling sound. When Kurt’s hand came away it was empty. One of the other men swore, then yelled, “Hold him!”

I was pressed into the door behind Kurt, and their combined weight pushed him backward against me. I couldn’t breathe. But my arm was free, and I reached for my pistol, my fingers fumbling in the folds of my skirt. I heard another man grunt, and Kurt pushed them both back with a wordless shout. He’d won another knife in the struggle, and now they warily gave him space.

The pistol felt heavy and unfamiliar in my cold hands. I was shaking, and sank down in the doorway so I could steady my arm against my knees. Kurt moved in front of me, feinting to keep one of the men back—but the other was coming. I could see him in the space that Kurt couldn’t block.

The sound of the shot surprised me, and how quickly the man dropped. I had barely touched the trigger.

“Gods and devils,” the last of them gasped. He backed away. His silhouette blocked the light from the courtyard for a moment; then he was gone.

Kurt’s hands on my arms pulled me to my feet. He had to keep hold of me while I shook, my teeth chattering together. I could barely make out the contours of his scarred face in the little light that shone from the courtyard. “Are you wounded?” he asked me for the second time that night.

I had to swallow before I could speak. “N-no.”

He took the pistol from my hand and shoved it into his belt. Behind him, one of the men on the ground groaned.

“Come on, Green Blood,” he said, wrapping a steadying arm around my shoulders and leading us through the alleyway. “You’re about to make my life more exciting than Constantin—and that isn’t a compliment.”

I wrapped my arms over my bodice and started to feel warmth coming back into my fingers. The shaking was starting to wane. I began to feel tired and heavy, clumsy in a different way. I took a deep breath for the first time in long minutes. “Can you call me that now?” I asked.

When he answered, I could feel the vibration of his voice against my arm. “My lady,” he said, emphasizing the words, “I’ll call you what I like,” which surprised me and made me laugh, shakily.

We’d reached the wash of lantern light that illuminated Prince’s Place when I thought to say what I should have said before. “Kurt—thank you.”

He glanced down at me and then let me go, taking a step away. “Your uncle’s gold is all the thanks I need,” he said, and again he sent me on before him. That was how we reached the safety of the palace, a disheveled Lady De Sardet and her Coin Guard.

***

In the morning, Kurt was waiting for me in the courtyard. “You all right?” he asked before he handed me my rapier.

I weighed the familiar blade in my hand and avoided his eyes, remembering the dreams that had woken me last night with the echoes of gunfire.

“Green Blood, if you’re getting ready to lie to me, know that I’ve seen plenty of recruits after their first combat. –Whatever you’re feeling, there’s no shame in it.”

I studied him with new eyes—his weathered face, the scars he’d earned before he’d even entered our service, the great sword he wore on his back that I’d seen him wield in the courtyard with an ease that belied how heavy it was. Yesterday morning, all of this had been only a game of skill. Now I was starting to realize how unready I was to face anything more than a straw man.

I asked the question that I had to ask. “Did I kill that man?”

His answer didn’t spare me. “Probably, in the end. The bullet hit him in the chest—the lung, if not the heart.”

“We should have helped him.”

To his credit, Kurt didn’t laugh at me. “It’s a kind thought, Green Blood. But my duty isn’t to a murderous piece of scum that crawled up out of the canal.”

When I said nothing, Kurt reached out to take the rapier from my clenched fingers. “If you hadn’t put that man down,” he said, “he would have hurt you. He might have killed you. The world isn’t kind to the ones who can’t defend themselves. Now—it’s past time I showed you how to fight an opponent in close quarters like that.”

Before long, Kurt had knocked me to the ground so many times that all the disquiet I’d felt earlier had been pushed aside. I was bruised and sweating and feeling more like myself. He came at me again, hands raised to grab my shoulders, but this time I was fast enough. I ducked, avoiding his hands when he reached for me. Before he could recover his balance, I had taken a step, forcing my way through the gap between his arms and legs, and pivoted to his shoulder, and as he tried to straighten again, he felt the hilt of my knife press into his throat.

“Good,” he said, and I stepped back, lowering my arm. “You survived that time.”

He brought water from the pump at the side of the courtyard, and we sat on the steps. Normally he would have pointed out all my mistakes and how to fix them, but today he just sat, watching a few of the palace guards sparring with their blades until I broke the silence.

“Kurt, has Constantin ever killed anyone?” If he had, he had never told me. Would he have kept something like that to himself? As soon as the question came to my mind, I realized I wasn’t sure I would tell him what I’d done last night. Would he judge me for it?

Kurt settled his elbows on his knees and looked over at me. “Not in front of me, Green Blood. And I’d wager not at all. By some miracle, I’ve kept him out of the wrong alleyways.”

I nodded, looking toward the sparring, though my thoughts were elsewhere.

“What about your investigation?” Kurt said finally. “We should find the doctor. Go and make yourself pretty so we can get started.”

He might only have been commenting on the number of wardrobe changes my life required. But when he said it, I pictured Constantin’s face if he’d heard and how mercilessly he would have tormented Kurt, and I smiled. I looked sidelong at him, damp strands of my hair sticking to my face, feeling that smile curving my lips. “Kurt, do you think I’m pretty?”

He raised a scarred eyebrow at me. “I’m thinking,” he said, “that you didn’t work hard enough today.” He reached out—to grab me, maybe, or give me a shove—but I was already up and away, laughing at him.

***

The doctor kept neat papers and rows of identical phials on shelves, but without knowing the name of the plant he’d mentioned, I had no way of knowing if the poison or its recipe were among them. On a shelf labeled “Antidotes,” several bottles were missing—taken for Constantin, I hoped.

We went back into the city. Sérène’s shops were dwindling as our merchants dwindled, taken by the malichor, but it still took us into the afternoon to find the apothecary near the harbor who imported rare plants and potions. He answered my questions, at first. _Solanum dulcamara_ , bittersweet, was the name of the plant that paralyzed without causing death. He kept it in stock. It was therapeutic in some cases, to thin out the blood. Of course, some wanted it for more arcane uses—superstitions, really—it was said bittersweet, when hung around the neck, warded off demons. He sold sachets of it to visitors from Thélème. Ironic then, wasn’t it, that his supply was brought to him by traders from Al Saad.

When I asked if anyone from the palace had bought bittersweet from him recently, he stopped his bustling behind the counter and turned to consider me. “I can give you that information,” he said slowly, weighing the words. “I’ll even let you name a fair price for it, Lady De Sardet.”

I had expected to pay to get the information I was after. I was the Prince’s niece, and his subjects assumed that those who lived in the palace had everything they did not. The truth, though, was that Kurt was probably richer than I was. He was paid for his work, after all, while I depended on the small allowance my mother and I received, which had only grown smaller as the malichor sapped the Prince’s treasury. It hurt to part with that gold.

But this was the quickest way, and the surest. I untied the small purse from my belt and piled twenty gold coins into my hand, a fortune to me. I placed the coins on the counter. “For whatever papers or records you can give me,” I said. “I need something more solid than your word.”

The gold disappeared in his hand. He asked us to wait with a smile and a bow and disappeared into a back room. When he returned, he placed two slips of paper on the counter—one a cheque written in the doctor’s hand for money to be paid by the palace, the other a page from the apothecary’s inventory recording the sale of bittersweet.

The doctor had plotted to poison my cousin, and he had used my uncle’s gold to do it.

***

I couldn’t help but be a little impressed that the doctor wasn’t wilting already, the way Kurt was glowering at him from his position by the door, arms crossed over his chest. The doctor had leaned forward in his chair when we came in, and now he was watching me attentively as I stood in front of his desk.

I took a breath. “How is my cousin?” I asked.

“Recovering remarkably well,” he replied with a smile that I thought was meant to be soothing. “His Highness is young and healthy; you can be sure he won’t have any lasting harm from this misfortune.”

“I am glad,” I said. “And I hope he won’t need your services any longer.”

At the sharpness of my tone, he lost some of his smile. “It’s true that—” he started slowly, but I interrupted, unable to hold my tongue any longer and let him sit there so unperturbed.

“I have proof, doctor, that you planned to poison my cousin, and that you used his friends to carry out that plan. If you don’t confess to the Prince d’Orsay, I’ll give him what I have and you’ll still be proven guilty by your own hand.”

The doctor looked from me to Kurt and back again. Then he settled back into his chair, crossing one leg over the other and resting his hands on the arms. He said nothing.

“If you run,” I heard Kurt say behind me, “you won’t make it to the city gate before the guards catch up with you.”

“I have no intention of running,” the doctor said, “or of leaving this position.”

“So you’ll confess?” I asked.

“No, my lady, I will not.”

“Then I will take the truth to the prince. The end is the same for you, either way.”

He opened his hands but was too dignified to shrug. “As you will, Lady De Sardet.”

Something was wrong. He had poisoned the prince’s son, but there was no sign of fear in him at the thought that the prince would know he was guilty. He didn’t fear punishment; he was daring me to take my proof and go to the prince. I studied his face, his expression carefully composed, and knew.

“Someone is protecting you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Everybody say it with me--"things are about to get dicey!"
> 
> Originally I had De Sardet taking Kurt down with a jiu jitsu move because there aren't any self-defense videos online for ladies in gowns with knives in their boots. But that inevitably led to the question of, how am I going to do this in a gown, Kurt? So I decided that, sadly, they didn't let ladies practice jiu jitsu in 1700s AU-France.


	3. Poison

Kurt’s hand around my arm was the only thing that kept me from running down the corridor once we had left the doctor’s quarters. He pulled me around to face him before we had gone more than a dozen steps.

“Calm,” he muttered, as though we were practicing in the courtyard and I had just taken a bad shot. I had to crane my head back to look up at him. “You don’t know who your enemies are, Green Blood. Don’t show them weakness.”

“I want to see Constantin.” It was an effort to keep my voice from shaking.

“And we will,” he said, “But be calm about it.”

When I nodded, he let me go. I took a breath and smoothed my cold hands over my skirts. I could still feel my heart beating hard, but I managed to walk at a sedate pace the whole long way to Constantin’s chambers.

When we arrived, however, two Coin Guards were stationed at the door. Why did my cousin need guards so close within the palace walls? But they had already seen me; I couldn’t hesitate. I approached them, trying to show only the simple expectation that they would open the door for me. 

One of the guards held out a hand to stop me.

“I need to see my cousin,” I said.

“My lady,” the man said with a note of apology, “We have orders to escort you to the prince.”

I scraped together all the hauteur a girl of eighteen could muster, lifted my head, and stared him in the eye. “Let me pass.” So rarely did I feel I had the need or the ability to command anyone, but I tried now. “How pleased do you think His Highness will be once he learns that you kept his cousin away from him?”

“These are our orders, Lady De Sardet,” was his only reply. He looked from me to Kurt. He may have been apologetic, but it seemed no threat I could wield would make him disobey. Kurt and I might fight our way through—if he would fight against his brothers—but what then? Barricade ourselves in Constantin’s rooms against the entire palace?

Behind me, Kurt spoke before I could continue these pointless thoughts. “I’ll take her.”

The guard nodded crisply. “Captain. Allow me to accompany you.”

“If you have to,” Kurt replied. He sounded so perfectly his usual, gruff self, while I was being torn apart inside by fear and worry. For once, I was thankful for the stiff bodice of my gown that kept my back straight as I walked between them. I remembered Kurt’s words and tried for calm, but I could only keep my hands from shaking by burying them in my skirts.

This late in the afternoon, the Prince d’Orsay retired to his office to work through the stack of papers he received every day. The room was richly appointed with thick woven carpets from Al Saad and heavy silk curtains in our colors of blue and gold, and the wooden floors gleamed. When Kurt and the other guard escorted me in, my uncle was sitting at his desk, his face settled into a frown as he read the paper in his hand. He looked up as we entered and placed the paper on his desk.

I curtseyed. “Serene Majesty, I hail you.”

“Thank you, Lieutenant” he said. I heard the rustle of cloth as the man gave a salute and turned to leave.

Then he addressed Kurt. “Captain, you may wait outside.”

I don’t think I imagined that Kurt hesitated for a moment. But after all, it was my uncle who held his contract and my uncle’s word that commanded him. He had to leave me. I was so tempted to glance at him before he left, but I held my curtsey and kept my eyes lowered.

“Your Majesty,” Kurt replied, and then he was gone, closing the door behind him.

I felt the prince’s gaze on me for a long moment before he acknowledged me. “Lady De Sardet. How have you fared with your questions?”

I rose from my curtsey and clasped my hands against my bodice, daring to look up at my uncle’s face before I answered. “Your Majesty, I learned that it was one of Constantin’s friends, Hugo Marchand, who slipped poison into his wine.”

“Yes,” my uncle replied, “The city guard have the boy in their cells even now, awaiting punishment.”

Marchand. All the time I’d known him, he’d been so quick to smile and laugh. In spite of what he’d done, I couldn’t help the ache of grief I felt for him now.

I could have left it there, said I knew nothing else. The poisoner had been found; punishment would be dealt. My uncle may have been satisfied with that. But it was the doctor who I wanted to see punished, and I needed to know what shadow was behind him that Constantin and I had been all unaware of.

“Marchand was paid to poison Constantin, Your Majesty,” I continued. “I have written proof that the palace’s doctor bought the poison. I am sure Marchand will confirm that the doctor approached him—perhaps if you offer him clemency.”

My uncle’s gaze sharpened in response to that suggestion. “Why would the doctor have abandoned his oaths and poisoned my son, Niece?”

“I believe he must have been ordered to.”

“By whom?” my uncle asked. “Guess if you must,” he added, his voice severe, when he saw me hesitate.

All the old gods help me. I was about to do something incredibly foolish. “When I spoke with him, the doctor showed no sign of fear at the thought that you might learn what he’d done.” Now I watched my uncle’s face; I couldn’t risk missing his reaction. “Which leads me to think—you, Your Majesty, or someone you protect.”

I don’t know what response I expected, but it certainly wasn’t for my uncle to smile and sit back, relaxed, in his chair, as though I’d somehow satisfied him. “Brave, girl,” he said, “to accuse me to my face. –It may interest you to know that it was the Princess d’Orsay who ordered Constantin poisoned.”

“But why?” I blurted before I thought, then caught myself. “If I may know.”

“My lady keeps her reasons to herself,” he said, wryly, amazing me with his lack of restraint. “I believe she intends to influence him away from the company he keeps in the city.”

He said nothing more but studied me while I struggled to understand—to accept—what I’d just learned.

“You know we are establishing a colony on the island that the Nauts discovered, Teer Fradee,” he said finally, catching me off guard with the change in topic.

“Yes, Your Majesty.” Constantin had shared with me some of the stories the Nauts told down in the Coin Tavern of strange tribes that could call magic from the land, seas that almost boiled with fish, and a sky so full of birds that sailors on deck had been knocked senseless when a flock flew past their ship.

My uncle sat up straight-backed again and drew formality about himself like a cape. “Once we’re established, it is my intention to send Constantin there as the governor of New Sérène. But he will need help. I am planning to send you with him as legate, to advise him and manage affairs of diplomacy with our allies and the natives.”

Some of my wonder must have shown on my face; when he continued, my uncle gave me a quelling look. “All of this,” he said, “Is contingent upon you both successfully completing your studies—and giving me the impression that you are capable and worthy of being trusted with our ventures and our reputation. My son, no doubt, will need your help in this.”

“Your Majesty,” I said, curtseying as was expected when the prince offered such a gift. “I know Constantin will make you proud, and I would love nothing more than to help him.” Was he truly offering me this future? I would be allowed to stay with Constantin, as we were now, and we would be able to leave the city, to travel to a new world.

Once I had straightened again, he continued. “You have been wondering about your situation.”

“I have been,” I confessed. He meant my mysterious suitors, who courted him and never showed their faces to me.

“In a year, I had hoped to have found you a suitable match. It seems your worth is a matter for some debate, however.” He paused, but I was careful not to betray my feelings. This matter had hung over me for so long and my thoughts toward it had grown so dark that I felt nothing he could say would shock me. “I expect I will see more value from you as a legate of the Congregation than I would from the gold to be had from a rich man’s coffers.”

I had been wrong. After so many revelations in such short time, I was not sure how to feel toward my uncle. But this was praise, in a way, that I had not expected. “Thank you, Uncle,” I murmured, lowering my gaze in an attempt to keep my emotions to myself.

“I will tell De Courcillon that your apprenticeship starts today,” my uncle said, dismissing me.

***

Kurt wasn’t able to get anything out of me at first when I left the prince’s office, though he questioned me as I led him back down the corridor. My thoughts were far away, on an island across the sea; I almost didn’t remember that Kurt knew nothing of what I’d learned and still didn’t know where the danger lay. When I had finally told him everything, in murmurs so no one would overhear, his expression darkened, though he kept his thoughts to himself.

“Will you go see Constantin now?” he asked, glaring off down the corridor, but I imagined he wasn’t seeing the stone walls or the banners.

“In a little while,” I said. “There’s something else I have in mind first.”

I left him outside my chambers. I checked my rooms to be sure I was alone; Eugenie was probably below stairs repairing the seams I’d cut in the gown and petticoat I wore yesterday. In the middle of my bedchamber, I wrapped my arms around myself, leaned back my head and sighed. Relief and disbelief bubbled up with laughter, and I scrubbed my face with my hands. I was free—a servant of the crown, in the end, but my body and my mind were my own to a greater degree than I had ever thought to hope for.

Now to show it. I managed to undress myself with some difficulty and contortions and stood in front of my mirror in my underthings, my hair hanging loose in dark waves past my shoulders. I might miss it, even when I had to waste so much time in caring for it. But it was hair—if I wanted, it would grow back. I gathered it in my hand and used my knife to cut it short, just at the nape of my neck. There was more that could be done to frame my face and fix the mess I was sure I’d created in the back, but I would have to convince Eugenie to do that for me once she’d gotten over the shock of seeing all of her mistress’s hair on the floor.

I pulled my chemise over my head and traced my fingers over the lines that the stays of my gown had left in the skin over my ribs. Even as a woman, I could wear the clothes of an official of the prince’s government now. I dressed in fawn-colored breeches, linen shirt, and blue doublet, resolving to steal a longer waistcoat and coat from Constantin for Eugenie to tailor to fit me. The gown, a saffron yellow silk, I laid on my bed. I would give it and all the rest to Eugenie if she wanted them; I had no need of them anymore.

Feeling lighter in body and spirit, I left my rooms only to hear Kurt’s huffed laugh as I shut the door.

“What?” I asked, narrowing my eyes at him. He was looking at me with an odd smile.

He shook his head, shrugging. “It’s about time.”

***

The Coin Guards had left Constantin’s doorway, and Kurt left me there as well.

“I have a few words in mind for someone,” he said darkly as he turned to go. Was he going to see my uncle? As much as I might want to hide outside the door and listen to _that_ conversation, I wanted more to see Constantin.

Constantin’s valet opened the door when I knocked. As soon as I reached the threshold of my cousin’s bedchamber, I could tell that the winds of his mood had changed. He was sitting up in bed, staring toward the window and the piece of sky visible outside it and brooding, his hands resting on top of the blankets. But when he heard me and turned, his frown was swiftly replaced by wide, astonished eyes and a dawning smile.

“My fair cousin!” he said, and I couldn’t help grinning in response. “I’ve been trapped here for two days, and already the world is changing. What have you done to yourself?” He reached out to me—with his right hand, I noticed, the side that had been paralyzed—and I went to stand beside his bed.

He grabbed my hand. “Are you well, Constantin?” I asked. “Your hand has recovered at least.”

“I will be,” he said. “There is a twitch in my leg, but the crow tells me that will go away. Twitch or no, I fully intend to escape this room and my kind doctor’s tortures by tomorrow. –But tell me what has happened to you. Here, sit.”

Days ago I might still have climbed onto his bed like I had when we were children. Now that I knew what happened in a man’s bed, though, I hesitated, realizing uncomfortably that I was feeling shy here in my cousin’s room. I sat because he asked me, but only perching on the edge of the bed with one boot on the floor.

“Cousin?”

I pushed that feeling aside. It wasn’t difficult to remember to be joyful, with my uncle’s words still echoing in my memory. Some of what I had to tell Constantin would hurt him, and I was sorry for that. But at the end of it all, there was our shining chance to live our lives outside of Sérène and his father’s plans.

“I’ll tell you,” I said, “but you have to promise me that you won’t say anything until I’m finished. Promise me,” I repeated, giving him a look. One thing Constantin was not was quiet.

“I promise,” he replied, leaning forward to rest his other hand over mine and looking at me with such solemn sincerity that I knew he was laughing behind that face. He was performing, like he did so often, but I knew that he was genuinely happy to see me. It was so good to see him cheerful. “I am all attention,” he added, leaning back against his pillows.

I told him the story, starting with the conversation Kurt and I had had with the doctor and Kurt’s suspicions, then the questions that had led me through half of the old city, and ending with the revelations his father had shared. I did not tell him everything Miranda had told me, only that she had refused the money the doctor offered and named Marchand. I also did not tell him about the ambush in the alleyway, or that I had killed a man. It wasn’t important right now, I told myself.

He kept his promise, but I watched his face change as I talked until he was staring out the window again with hard eyes and a hard mouth. “That black-hearted crow,” he muttered when I had finished. He looked at me. “Will my father punish him?”

“He said nothing about it. Your mother—”

“My _mother_ ,” he interrupted, with a bitter laugh. Then he was shoving at the blankets that covered him. “Cousin, help me. Now that I’ve recovered, I should go see my mother.”

He stood, leaning on my arm, and before he had gone two steps, his valet hurried into the room to help him with his clothes. I waited by the window in the sitting room, looking out and seeing nothing, until Constantin appeared fully dressed, shaking off the valet as the man helped him into the room.

“Are you sure you should do this, Constantin?” I murmured as we went down the corridor, arm in arm, slowed by the limp in his right leg. “Won’t it just make matters worse between you?”

He laughed under his breath. “The only thing she has yet to do is kill me, isn’t it? And that is the one thing I can be sure she will not do. …Fortunately, heirs to the throne are a rare commodity.

“But you,” he said, the bite gone out of his voice, “I wouldn’t bring you into this.”

I shook my head. Let him try to leave me behind. “Of course I’m going with you.”

The Princess d’Orsay had always seemed a glittering person to me, but her shine had the sharpness of a knife’s edge that might cut the one that admired it too carelessly. Constantin took after her in looks, with his high cheekbones, pale complexion, and ash blonde hair. In temperament, she often seemed merry like my cousin, but those on the receiving end of her merriment tended to come away feeling like they were bleeding. I was fortunate that she didn’t pay me much attention. But Constantin—I had witnessed how his relationship with his mother had changed since we were children. She no longer brought him to tears, but I was sure that was because he had no love left for her anymore.

A maid admitted us to the princess’s chambers, and I felt Constantin’s muscles tense under his sleeve. I let go of his arm as we waited in her sitting room, knowing that he wouldn’t want to appear vulnerable in front of her. In moments, she swept out of her bedchamber in a burgundy evening gown, extending her hands toward Constantin.

“My son has rejoined the living!” she exclaimed.

Constantin, his arms held stiff at his sides, didn’t move except to jerk his head away as his mother reached up to touch his face.

“Isn’t that what you expected, Mother?” he replied sharply. “This incident was by your design.”

“Mm.” She considered him and then me and moved away to pour herself a glass of wine from the decanter that rested on a small table.

“An innocent man is locked up because of your machinations.”

“Innocent!” she repeated, laughing as though he’d just told a joke. “That man put a poisoned glass in your hand, Constantin.”

“He was a friend—”

“Was he?” the princess interrupted, her voice suddenly low and dangerous. She faced her son head on. “I can tell you how many coins that friendship was worth. Would you like to know? It wasn’t a large sum, in the end. –Your friends hope to gain something from you, Constantin, and your lovers—”.

“Don’t.”

“Miranda Chastain—she is the one you’ve been seeing? Did you know that Lord and Lady Chastain have had an audience with your father? They asked that she might be your official mistress, with quarters in the palace for her and her parents. They are running from the malichor, trying to cling to you—”

“Your Highness—” I broke in, but Constantin stopped me, clamping his hand down on my shoulder, his fingers on my collarbone hard enough to bruise.

“Your work is done, Mother,” he said slowly. Everything about him was tense, as if he was forcibly restraining himself. “You don’t need to say more. If it’s your wish that I care nothing for anyone in Sérène, I can promise you I don’t—and you least of all.

“In a few years, I’ll leave this city for Teer Fradee,” he continued, and there was something hectic in his voice. “Perhaps I’ll turn native and be done with crowns and politics. –Nothing would please me more than to be your worst failure.”

His hand left my shoulder. I turned to see him lurch toward the door. He slammed it closed behind him, and it trembled in its hinges. Behind me, the princess sighed.

“Not all poisons are poured from a bottle,” she murmured, almost as if she were talking to herself. “A lady of the court should know how to wield them all. –But then, you are no longer a lady, are you, De Sardet.”

I looked back to find her sipping from her glass and considering me as if trying to decide what sort of creature I was.

“Your Highness,” I said. My throat felt raw, though I hadn’t been the one shouting. “Isn’t there another way?”

“You know him better than I. –Is there?”

Some things could not be fixed. I caught myself before I curtseyed and bowed instead, leaving her to go find my cousin.

***

“You move fast for a man with a twitchy leg.”

He didn’t laugh. My attempt at humor had been doomed from the start. I had found him in one of our places, the back of the kitchen garden, beneath an old apple tree that a gardener had decided to let grow wild before we were born. By now, all of the fruit had been harvested, and most of the leaves had fallen and been raked away. He sat with his back against the crumbling garden wall, his arms on his knees and his head resting on the stones, eyes closed. I sat beside him, our legs and shoulders touching.

“Constantin, don’t hate Miranda for being afraid,” I said after a moment.

He made some sound that I couldn’t interpret, something between a chuckle and a growl. A choked sound. “How do you still have such a kind heart, Cousin?” he asked, finally opening his eyes and looking at me. “It’s a miracle.”

“Your heart is kind. You know it, and I know it.”

“Don’t count on that,” he replied, under his breath. “This place…

“Cousin, you are the only one—” He broke off, frowning a little, his eyes studying mine. “The only one I can trust. To not want something from me.”

I wished I could say there were others. But in our lives—more so in Constantin’s life—there were servants, subjects, and family. And family was often the most demanding. We had grown up with no other children in House Orsay, only the two of us. The circle we formed was small, and it had closed a long time ago.

I thought to say something to make him smile—perhaps that he gave me too much credit, and I was selfishly plotting to keep him with me. Instead, I wound my arm through his and rested my head on his shoulder. “I’m with you,” I said. “Here and across the sea.”

“Do you think it will happen?”

“Yes,” I said without hesitation, looking up at him. “It will. We’re going to go to Teer Fradee.”

He smiled at me with an echo of his normal cheer. “If you say it like that, then I have to believe you, Cousin.

“We’ll go,” he said, then more firmly, “We’ll go and be free of all this.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I need more villainesses in my life. Princess d'Orsay will definitely be making more appearances. :)
> 
> And I finally have most of this series plotted out in my head! Now I just need to survive the first drafts. Send good muse vibes!

**Author's Note:**

> I think this is going to end up as the start of a series on De Sardet and Constantin's relationship--so if you're a Constantin fan, stay tuned!
> 
> Chapter 2 will be up on 1/25, and Chapter 3 will be up on 2/1.


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